The tragic death of Thomas Merton

This day in 1968

Trappist Father M. Louis, OCSO, popularly known as Thomas Merton, died in Thailand on this date, December 10, in 1968, the result of accidental electrocution from touching a fan while exiting a bathtub/shower. “A police test of the fan showed that a ‘defective electric cord was installed inside its stand…. The flow of electricity was strong enough to cause the death of a person if he touched the metal part.’”¹

The famous monk and writer, 53, had arrived at Kentucky’s Abbey of Gethsemani 27 years earlier, on the same date, December 10, in 1941.

He was in Thailand to attend and speak at an ecumenical conference attended by many religious including Rembert Weakland, the former abbot of Saint Vincent Archabbey (Latrobe, Pennsylvania), then Abbot Primate of the Benedictine Confederation.

Merton delivered an address to the conference in the morning. At about three in the afternoon “Father François de Grunne, who had a room near Merton’s, heard a cry and what sounded like someone falling. He knocked on Merton’s door but there was no response … he looked through the louvers in the upper part of the door and saw Merton lying on the terrazzo floor. A standing fan had fallen on top of him. Father de Grunne tried to open the door, but it was locked. With the help of others, the door was opened.”²

The priests gave Merton absolution, and it was Dom Rembert Weakland, who gave Merton extreme unction. After Merton’s body was released to Dom Weakland, it was washed and taken to the chapel where a prayer vigil was held throughout the night.

The next day Merton’s body was taken to the United States Air Force Base in Bangkok and from there flown to Oakland, California. From there, it continued by commercial carrier, reaching the Abbey of Gethsemani the afternoon of December 17.

The casket arrived at the monastery only hours before the afternoon funeral Mass and was placed in the abbey basilica. His remains were then interred in the small cemetery next to the abbey church.

“A whole bunch of us grabbed shovels to fill in Father Louis’s grave at the end of the service,” Father Patrick (Reardon) recalled. “I remember Father Raymond (Flanagan) going at it with the gusto he brought to every enterprise. Toward the end of the burial, it began to rain, so we were quite damp when we returned to the church.”³

May he rest in peace.

(The Merton Center at Bellarmine)

1. Thomas Merton’s Last Three Days – Jim and Nancy Forest

2. Ibid.

3. Ibid.